What are these?

[Bagodragon]

I have been keeping salt/reef tanks for about 10 years now. However, this is the first tank I have used metal halide on. I recently noticed several of the golden "sacks" growing on my rocks. I have never seen them before and have no idea what they are. Some are small and some are about 2 inches wide. Any help in the indentification of these would be greatly appreciated. Just want to make sure I don't have some major infestation going on.

 

[Anonymous]

It's hard to tell from those pictures what they are. My initial thought would be Padina sp. (algae).

mario

 

[LeslieH1]

Padina's fronds are thin and rufflied. These are inflated sacks which means it's most likely the brown bubble alga Colpomenia sinuosa which is common worldwide in tropical waters.

 

[meshal001]

this is some kind of algea,,, but I could not specify the type due to the pictures resolotion. 8O

 

[Bagodragon]

Sorry, those were the best ones I could take, the other pics were even fussier.

A little more detailed description: They are metalic looking gold sachs with little fibers (maybe a couple millimeters long) comming off of them. A couple have "popped" and do look like when green bubble algea pop. Some have alot of folds and some are near perfert spheres.

If it is brown bubble what is the best thing to get rid of it? I've had green bubble before and had no problem taking care of it with crabs. Will the same thing work for this?

 

[LeslieH1]

I don't know what eats Colpomenia. The brown algae have different chemical compounds which are more effective at stopping herbivores from munching on them than green algae. You may need to take them out by hand. The little hairs might be either reproductive structures or another filamentous algae growing on them - I'd have to see some under a microscope to be sure.

 

[Anonymous]

Agreed that it's Colpomenia. We have some of this at the aquarium under 1000W MHs. It doesn't grow particularly fast and is fairly easy to manually remove by hand.